Blizzard babies born in ambulances, parking lots

Parents, children will have memories of 2013 blizzard

Her timing could have been better, but to her parents, the baby who was born in a hospital parking lot in the blizzard is perfect.

Donna Ambrosia went into labor at home on Friday and a Colchester, Conn., ambulance took her and her husband, James, to Norwich.

James said that even with a plow escort, the ambulance ride took 45 minutes through the blizzard.

Their baby, Elizabeth Judy, was born in the back of the ambulance as it arrived at the hospital, helped by a doctor who ran out of the emergency room and into the ambulance as it pulled into the parking lot.

In Ashland, Mass., emergency crews had to respond to two homes overnight Saturday, where women were in labor.

The first call came in just after midnight for a woman in labor. She was taken to the hospital without incident.

However, a second woman delivered her new son in an ambulance on the way to the hospital. Emergency responders got that call just after 3 a.m.

In Worcester, a Massachusetts National Guard EMT assisted a Worcester EMT with delivering Ericka Bueno's baby on Verizon Hill about 3 a.m. Saturday. The baby girl was named Nohely.

Kingston firefighters delivered a baby girl at the height of the blizzard after snow and debris kept them from arriving in time to take the mother to the hospital, according to the Patriot Ledger.

Capt. Adam Hatch said dispatchers received a call around 3:30 a.m. Saturday about a mother in active labor at a home on Pembroke Street. The house was no more than two miles from the fire station, but it took an ambulance more 30 minutes to navigate through the blinding snow and downed tree limbs and wires, he said.

By the time an ambulance arrived at the house, it was too late to bring the mother to a hospital. Hatch said three firefighters – William Brown, Chris McPhee and Jim Reed – delivered the baby girl around 4:07 a.m.

?Everything was fine,? he said. ?The delivery was fine and the mother and the child were both very healthy.

The mother and baby were taken to Jordan Hospital. All three firefighters had been trained as a paramedic or medical technician.

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